In a 1943 United States Supreme Court case which held that a West Virginia School Board could not compel objecting students to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, Justice Robert Jackson wrote: “[i]f there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein”. That case and that sentiment have formed the basis of the law prohibiting the government from compelling speech since that time.
